My research interests are in landscape and spatial ecology and conservation biology. Using a combination of tools and techniques derived from remote sensing, spatial statistics, and population genetics, I seek to enhance understanding of the ecological mechanisms that generate and maintain species diversity and connectivity at landscape scales.

My postdoctoral research will (1) enhance efforts to identify current and future terrestrial and aquatic connectivity among and within NWRs and other protected areas in Alaska and Northwest Canada; (2) use connectivity models and climate change projections to assess landscape vulnerability (exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity); and (3) identify and provide data necessary to inform landscape conservation design.

This project is being conducted in collaboration with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Northwest Boreal Landscape Conservation Cooperative.

Erik Schoen (Postdoctoral Fellow)

Trailer T-10907.474.7735M.S. - University of WashingtonI am interested in how the physical environment mediates interaction strengths in aquatic food webs. My postdoctoral research focuses on relationships between the climate, landscape, hydrology, salmon populations, and people of the Kenai River Watershed. This project focuses on 1) how climate change is influencing the quantity and quality of salmon habitat (in terms of stream flow and temperature), 2) how these changes vary from the glacial and snow-fed mountain sub-basins in the east to the primarily rain-fed lowland sub-basins to the west, and 3) what this means for salmon and the wildlife and people who depend on them. This project is part of the Alaska EPSCoR program funded by NSF. I also study juvenile salmon growth in the Susitna River watershed and predation on juvenile Chinook salmon in the Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim region.